


A Mother's Joy

by GlowingMechanicalHeart



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Happy ending for Rhaella, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Mother-Son Relationship, Non-Canonical Character Death, Rhaella lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-15
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-11-01 00:21:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10910466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlowingMechanicalHeart/pseuds/GlowingMechanicalHeart
Summary: It should feel wrong to be so happy. But she doesn't care.





	A Mother's Joy

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All ASOIAF belongs to Martin, no money made, no ownership claimed

It should feel wrong to be so happy. But she doesn't care. 

Her family is dead, Summerhall reduced to bare bones and she married to Aerys. But her baby brings her so much joy, she cannot help it.

She spends every moment available with him, her Rhaegar, her precious boy. He is so sweet, so little, so adorable and so perfect in her eyes. She spends as much time as she can with him. Singing to him or just cradling him, she loves it when he falls asleep on her chest, with only her heartbeat as his lullaby.

And as he begins to grow, she enjoys all the firsts. Seeing him struggle to sit, having him try to give his first steps - to which she holds his little hands as he tries to walk. She dismisses his nurse and looks after him, after all, she is not so queenly that she cannot care for her baby. It is her who does her best to sooth him as he begins to grow teeth. She lets him chew on her finger and she makes soothing sounds in an effort to calm him down.

When Rhaegar finally speaks, it’s ‘mamma’ that comes first and her heart fills as it will burst of both joy and pride. Her joy is only marred when Aerys makes his displeasure know at 'father’ not being his first word. If she were braver she’d tell him to spend more time with their child, but she is not, so she remains silent.

It’s about the same time when Rhaegar starts to speak when she knows for sure that she is with child again. And she hopes she will have smooth pregnancy and no disasters strike again.

Her belly swells and she knows for sure that this will be a strong babe. For he kicks all the time, her ladies joke and say that the baby will be a dancer for all he moves inside her belly. And she whispers to her baby, she proclaims her love for it with a hand over her belly.

Viserys enters the world screaming his little lungs out, unlike Rhaegar, who only wept after being given a slap. Viserys cries and trashes and Rhaella fills her heart swell with love the moment he is placed on her arms. He is a little victory, he is joy and he is hers. Unlike Rhaegar, whom she must share with Aerys, Viserys will be hers alone she decides.

And she holds the baby for Rhaegar to see, and her heart skips a beat when he bends over and gives his brother a kiss. She feels tears coming and she lets them fall. For all her problems with Aerys, her now children are her greatest joy.

She enjoys Viserys the same way she did Rhaegar, she enjoys again all those moments she did with Rhaegar. She doesn’t think that she’ll ever grow tired of experiencing her children, loves those moments when Viserys nurses on her chest as she sings him lullabies.

She watches with pride as both her children grow, and she finds that she is still excited for all of Viserys’ first. Every time her boy does something for the first time, her heart swells with pride and joy.

She is on bed rest for her pregnancy for the third time when it happens. They day is so unremarkable, so common, that she doesn’t expect anything to happen. But she is wrong, she had just woken from a nap when Ser Selmy enters her room.

Aerys is dead. A broken neck after tripping on his robes when descending the Iron Throne after an argument with Lord Tywin. 

 _'Such a unremarkable death’_ , she thinks. 

She doesn’t cry. She has nothing to cry for. There is no love lost between her and Aerys. But she knows what this means, her little Rhaegar is King. A boy of five summers. And she knows that she will have to be fierce and protective, as much as the dragon on her sigil. She will not allow just anyone near her son.  
So she commands Ser Barristan to send a raven for her cousin, Steffon. She knows that she can trust him, it is him who will be Hand, she decides. As much as she knows that Lord Tywin is capable, she doesn’t want Aery’s men around her children. She will fight if she must, and she will protect her children -specially Rhaegar- at all cost.

Steffon arrives almost at the same time she goes to the birthing bed. Through her pain, she appoints him hand and co-regent. He squares his shoulders, accepts and leaves the room. And Rhaella screams, pushes, cries and holds onto the sheets beneath her fingers.

Her daughter arrives fighting, for she feels her kick on her tight as she leaves her body. And while she had know the joy of holding a newborn babe to her chest, this one feels different.

 _'Did my mother felt the same when she held me?’_ , she wonders.

Daenerys, she decides for the name. It is later, after the sheets have been changed that Steffon returns with her sons on each hand and she smiles at her cousin and waves at her children, she calls them to her and they go, each one climbs on each side of her and she lowers her sleeping girl for them to see.  
  
Rhaegar, ever so sweet, promises to be a good brother and kisses a her forehead. Viserys simply frowns and follows on his brother’s example. And Rhaella smiles. Today, nothing else matters, only this, only this very moment of her surrounded by her little loves and free of Aerys. Life will be good now, she knows.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback would be awesome, thank you for reading


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